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Castle Round Table: A Blip on the Net Continuum

Castle decided to enjoy technology's warm embrace this week. Unfortunately, it turned out to be a little cooler than he expected in "Meme is Murder."

Below, TV Fanatics, Stacy Glanzman, Michelle Carlbert, Jim Garner and Christine Orlando are joined by Denise from The 12th a Castle Fan Forum to debate Castle's new web-mercial, their thoughts on the double promo, Ryan's blog and their favorite scenes from Castle Season 7 Episode 5...

What did you think of Castle's web-mercial? Cheesy or Spoof-tastic?

Stacy: A little bit of both. It was pretty cheesy but it was silly and fun to watch too. I have a hard time believing that would be allowed to be sent out without his or his PR agent's permission though.

Michelle: Spoof-tastic with a side of cheese. I laughed through most of it, but there is just something about that auto-tune thing that makes my skin crawl so I could've done without that.

Jim: A bit of both, I knew it was going to be cheesy, but it was also very spoof-tastic.

Denise: I thought the webmercial was kind of goofy. I don't think they should have included all the gaffes and mistakes, maybe just one or two. The webmercial as shown just made Castle look rather silly, not as a best-selling author. Not a good way to treat your title character. Or maybe I just really don't understand the social media world!

Christine: It was a little too over the top. I like seeing the contrast between cool, confident Rick Castle and goofy Rick Castle but at times they make him look like a bumbling idiot and they take it too far. This was a little too far into the silly zone for me.

Stacy: I have actually and I loved that it came up in the episode. I haven't read it in awhile, but I've definitely checked it out a few times.

Michelle: No and in fact, I'm quite embarrassed to admit that I didn't even know about. Ryan is one of my favorite characters on the show so I can't believe I missed it. I'll definitely be looking out for it now.

Jim: I didn't realize it was a real thing, I will have to go check it out.

Denise: I have read The Ryan Report blog. I thought it was fun that they brought that up.

Christine: I have checked it out from time to time and it's fun to get the inside view into that character. I think I'll head over to it right now.

If you came across a "Like Me or Die" type post would you click on it or avoid it?

Stacy: There's no way I would vote for someone to live or die. Chances are I'd assume it wasn't real and just ignore it.

Michelle: Avoid it and call the police. What struck me as weird is that they didn't hit too much on the depravity of the people who WOULD click on such a thing. I was confused as to why they wouldn't just cut the feed, but I suppose Adam would have set it up so that if that happened, those two guys would die anyway. But I expected to see a conversation about the insanity of our world, where sickos would get their kicks clicking on something in the hopes that they see someone murdered.

Jim: I would avoid it. I also don't click on pictures/videos of animals being hurt or people being cruel to each other. I don't want or need any more of that type of thing in my life.

Denise: I have a tendency to take most things on social media with a grain of salt, so I probably would not have believed it was a real-life situation and avoided it.

Christine: I'm with Jim. I'd definitely avoid it. The internet has a lot of positives but it pays to avoid the negatives as much as possible. All people posting that stuff are looking for is attention. It's best not to give it to them.

Michelle: I thought it was intriguing that they would do that. I wonder if they were responding to fans being unhappy at the wedding being put off and this was their way to say "Hey! Keep watching, the wedding is coming. We really mean it this time!" I don't know. It seemed a little desperate to me.

Jim: It was a nice trade off for not having an episode next week. Seems fair if we have to wait two weeks, we get two promos.

Denise: Loved the double episode promo! I liked the tie-in of the wedding episode promo to the "honeymoon" episode promo. Really curious to see just what kind of wedding it's going to be.

Christine: Thrilled to see that the wedding is coming but a little hesitant too. I just hope it doesn't turn out to be 10 minutes stuck in between the case of the week. Fans deserve a lot more than that. Let's just say I have my fingers crossed that this will be the pay off we've all been waiting to see.

How active are you on social media?

Stacy: Mildly active. I check my Facebook about once a day, but I don't post too often. I didn't even have Twitter until a couple months ago and I have only used it to share my TV Fanatic reviews so far.

Michelle: Because of my job, I'm fairly active but not as active as some. I tend to use different platforms for different reasons. Such as using Twitter purely for posting all my articles and reviews, while going to Facebook to see how all my friends are doing. I'd like to think that I'm not tied to either, but the idea of going without checking Facebook for more than a couple days makes my palms sweat so I guess I'm just as guilty as anyone else who is addicted to it.

Jim: Very, more Facebook that Twitter. I was also strong in Community for video games for many many years.

Denise: I am not very active at all on social media. I have one or two social media accounts, basically just for keeping in touch with family and friends; I do very little actual posting myself. And after this episode, I think I'll keep it that way!

Christine: Fairly active. I have a lot of friends and family who live all across the country so I use Facebook to keep in touch with them. My Twitter account @ProudTVJunkie is for everything TV related and then I'm a member of some TV fan forums like the Castle fan forum The 12th.

What was your favorite scene from this episode?

Stacy: That 3-D printer was pretty cool. I had no idea you could make a key from a photograph. Castle's face was great too when he said he needed to get himself one.

Michelle: I really liked the way that Beckett was able to break Adam down and get him to give them some clues about where his victims were. She does a fantastic job at getting right into the heart of what makes a person tick and that scene showed it perfectly.

Jim: Mine wasn't a scene so much as a twist. That being we hadn't met the killer along the way. Many times we meet the real killer during the episode, this was a nice change of pace.

Denise: I have a couple: I like that Castle was back to his theorizing last night, and put the pieces together about the "spoiled brats" clue. I also very much liked the scene between Gates and Kate after netslayer posted that coffee picture of Kate and Rick, where Gates told Kate she was not going to take her off the case. I think that said a lot about Gates and how she trusts her team to solve the case in spite of what that picture indicated about their approach to the case, and the pressure she was getting from One PP.

Christine: I loved how Castle completely believed that Beckett was going to break Adam in interrogation. He has such confidence in her. On the flip side, I kind of loved it when Tatiana found her boyfriend in the car with his throat slit. I know that's horrible to say but she was such a spoiled brat that it was kind of satisfying see her get smacked with a deadly dose of reality.